By John Walker on October 12th, 2010 at 10:33 am.
I remember in the late 90s thinking to myself, “I wonder how people will spoof/retro this decade?” It was a ten year spread that seemed to be of such variation, and mostly made up of retroing various previous decades, that it seemed like it wouldn’t have a distinct flavour of its own. Of course, time passes and that all changes, as the splendid new pseudo-commercial for Super Meat Boy demonstrates. It’s an excellent production designed to capture the style of early 90s gaming advertising, as recorded on VHS. Despite the ad’s failure to mention the PC release, it’s coming out on the machine that made McMillen’s name a month later, on the 20th November.
12/10/2010 at 10:44 stahlwerk says:
Phew, that was quite xtreme.
I don’t know if I’m looking forward to having my face destroyed by the story, but I am a fan of HELLA TIGHT controls, so I’ll check it out.
13/10/2010 at 03:42 Soobe says:
I’m pretty sure “Hella Tight” was popularized by south park in 2007.
Other than that, spot on ad : )
13/10/2010 at 04:03 Nick says:
Nah, its Bay Area slang since the 90′s.
12/10/2010 at 10:48 poop says:
ahahahah really diggin the pretend shitty 3d rendering, nice touch
12/10/2010 at 11:31 stahlwerk says:
It’s great because COMPUTER GRAPHICS ARE AWESOME
12/10/2010 at 11:57 RogB says:
i’d just about forgotten that. wasnt it shit even at the time though? :)
12/10/2010 at 13:00 stahlwerk says:
I remember being totally amazed by it. But I was 11 years old then. The normal-(/”bump”)-mapping is quite good for that time, I guess. The colour scheme ist totally awful however. It seems the guy making it had two design goals imposed by the band: “How gold can we make it?” and “Could it be any more golden?”
What I now find peculiar about it is that it seems to be choking on the particle effects with a noticeable framerate drop. How would that even work on a prerendered video?
12/10/2010 at 13:09 SF Legend says:
Primitive 3d is always amazing.
12/10/2010 at 14:58 James T says:
I AM THE GOD OF HELLFIRE, AND I BRING YOU…!
12/10/2010 at 15:00 James T says:
Wow, how come link HTML never fucking works here anymore? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txQQzZ49zZA
12/10/2010 at 15:04 Man Raised By Puffins says:
You’re doing it wrong.
[a href=""][/a], substitute correct brackets where appropriate.
12/10/2010 at 15:30 knifethrower says:
12/10/2010 at 15:31 knifethrower says:
Uh right, that worked dandy….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6rMNGA9IRQ
12/10/2010 at 20:48 Stu says:
I love this 90s-era rave video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWswGiAms9U
Shonky 3D graphics and some obvious Deluxe Paint work make it a masterpiece in its field.
12/10/2010 at 22:52 Saul says:
Is that the Lucasarts logo dancing on the podium in the Prodigy video?
13/10/2010 at 00:04 James T says:
Precisely the tags I used.
12/10/2010 at 10:53 miked says:
Why, it is Quinns playing super meat boy!
12/10/2010 at 11:00 Lewie Procter says:
Playing this right now.
Shit be tight.
12/10/2010 at 11:02 Tom O'Bedlam says:
Fuck, its 1993 again. I can just aboout remember the Lightgun adverts on SNES.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQCK-KylXK8
12/10/2010 at 12:08 Robotenwerfer says:
Haha, thank you for posting this! It really shows how spot on the Super Meat Boy ad is
12/10/2010 at 15:24 Malawi Frontier Guard says:
I hope this is the “post bad 90s game ads” thread now.
Yoshi’s Island: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4AyE3EXTj58
12/10/2010 at 19:32 Shih Tzu says:
I hope so too!
Nintendo Power: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpoBISQmu8M
(I don’t know if they have it in the UK, but Nintendo Power is the official Nintendo magazine in North America. I had a subscription for a few years, until my mom got tired of the constant explosions.)
13/10/2010 at 01:12 Delusibeta says:
Shih Tzu: In the UK, the official Nintendo magazine was, in order, Nintendo Magazine System, Nintendo Magazine and Nintendo Official Magazine (all of which was published by the same company and had the same continuity i.e. the issue counter was never reset). Then Future got the license and began making Nintendo: The Official Magazine, confusingly.
12/10/2010 at 11:06 Brumisator says:
XTREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEME!
I’m no popmusic expert, but isn’t that music a little too 2000ish?
Great ad, marvelous job. I just hope that anyone who sees it understands the second degree of it.
12/10/2010 at 17:22 PleasingFungus says:
The music is a medley of actual music from the game, I believe.
13/10/2010 at 01:12 Arathain says:
I’m not sure I want the game. But I do want the soundtrack.
12/10/2010 at 12:12 Navagon says:
Poptastic shit!
12/10/2010 at 12:28 Robotenwerfer says:
Christ, they really aren’t kidding http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCQRcinZYH8
12/10/2010 at 14:02 haircute says:
Very spot on spoof. Now to go catch 120 minutes on MTV while slamming some Surge. Insert the appropriate UK equivalents here.
12/10/2010 at 20:37 Joe says:
MTV, Irn-bru
12/10/2010 at 14:04 Sunjammer says:
I’m so god damn tired of modern “retro” games trying so desperately hard to invoke nostalgia. It’s as though this genre of game has no merit without the past to lean on. Just make a good fucking game already, stop panicking so much.
12/10/2010 at 14:16 mondomau says:
Wait, what?
12/10/2010 at 14:18 Aubrey says:
Uh oh! Unpopular opinion alert! DOGPILE!
12/10/2010 at 14:42 kikito says:
Your controls are not tight enough.
12/10/2010 at 15:21 Sunjammer says:
I totally dig oldschool platformers. I don’t understand why they have to be so IN YOUR FACE nostalgic as well. It’s like developers gave up experimenting with that genre and are content to join an old gentleman’s club that’s going nowhere.
12/10/2010 at 15:42 cyrenic says:
What? Panic?
WOAH WHAT WAS THAT
12/10/2010 at 15:21 Patrick says:
Face not destroyed enough.
12/10/2010 at 15:52 wcaypahwat says:
was that a bad dudes reference in there?
12/10/2010 at 16:49 Igor Hardy says:
Wow! Just wow!
And John’s comment about how wondering how they’ll spoof the 90s perfectly captures the vid’s brilliance because it’s a damn hard thing to do that right.
12/10/2010 at 16:54 Pinky G says:
Brilliant advert, very funny! Good job. Looks like a really good game too. Looking forward to playing it.
12/10/2010 at 19:44 Awia says:
But is it Hella Tight?
12/10/2010 at 20:38 Joe says:
It’s a bit Nathan Barley. But I like it.
13/10/2010 at 02:05 Scandalon says:
Personally, I’m just relieved that there’s a 720 “HD” version of the video available, so we can fully appreciate the hella tight grafix.
13/10/2010 at 06:30 Travis says:
Interesting attempt, but made me want to play the game less. I’m just sick of twitchy-based platformers passing for indie game excellence. I wish people had better ideas than “strange premise + jump over deadly things”.
13/10/2010 at 07:21 MD says:
Bit unfair to suggest that those games “pass” for excellence. It’s just a matter of taste; some people genuinely find them extremely fun, and surely in the world of gaming extreme enjoyability counts as excellence.
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